Margaret Thatcher's Best Quotes

A Wall Street Journal Roundup

Updated April 8, 2013 3:11 p.m. ET

Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher—who died Monday from a stroke at age 87—retired from public engagements in 2002 following a series of small strokes, and was only occasionally seen in public since then.

Here are memorable quotes from her public life:

"If you want something said, ask a man; if you want something done, ask a woman." -- May 20, 1965, speech to National Union of Townswomen's Guilds Conference.

ENLARGE

Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher greeting people who gathered to see her in Moscow, during her official visit to the USSR in March 1987.
AFP/Getty Images

"There are dangers in consensus: it could be an attempt to satisfy people holding no particular views about anything.…No great party can survive except on the basis of firm beliefs about what it wants to do." -- Oct. 10, 1968, Conservative Party conference.

"I don't think there will be a woman Prime Minister in my lifetime." -- TV interview March 5, 1973.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I stand before you tonight in my red chiffon evening gown, my face softly made up, my fair hair gently waved…the Iron Lady of the Western World. Me? A Cold War warrior? Well, yes—if that is how they wish to interpret my defense of values of freedoms fundamental to our way of life." -- Jan. 31, 1976.

"The Russians are bent on world dominance, and they are rapidly acquiring the means to become the most powerful imperial nation the world has seen." -- From the speech that led to her being dubbed The Iron Lady, Jan. 19, 1976.

"To those waiting with bated breath for that favorite media catchphrase, the 'U' turn, I have only one thing to say. 'You turn if you want to. The lady's not for turning.' I say that not only to you but to our friends overseas and also to those who are not our friends." -- Conservative Party Conference, Oct. 1980.

"You don't win by just being against things, you only win by being for things and making your message perfectly clear." -- Feb. 11, 1975.

"I am extraordinarily patient, provided I get my own way in the end." -- House of Commons, March 31, 1982.

"Where there is discord, may we bring harmony. Where there is error, may we bring truth. Where there is doubt, may we bring faith. And where there is despair, may we bring hope." -- Quoting St. Francis of Assisi after winning the general election, May 1979.

'No! No! No!' statement in the House of Commons on European Council Summit Oct. 30, 1990

"When you've spent half your political life dealing with humdrum issues like the environment, it's exciting to have a real crisis on your hands." -- May 14, 1982, commenting on the Falkland Islands war.

"We fought to show that aggression does not pay and that the robber cannot be allowed to get away with his swag. We fought with the support of so many throughout the world.…Yet we also fought alone." -- July 3, 1982, on the Falkland Islands war.

"I was asked whether I was trying to restore Victorian values. I said straight out I was. And I am." -- July 21, 1983, speech to British Jewish Community.

"That nations that have gone for equality, like Communism, have neither freedom nor justice nor equality, they've the greatest inequalities of all, the privileges of the politicians are far greater compared with the ordinary folk than in any other country. The nations that have gone for freedom, justice and independence of people have still freedom and justice, and they have far more equality between their people, far more respect for each individual than the other nations. Go my way. You will get freedom and justice and much less difference between people than you do in the Soviet Union." -- TV interview, January 1983

"There is no week, nor day, nor hour, when tyranny may not enter upon this country, if the people lose their supreme confidence in themselves, and lose their roughness and spirit of defiance. Tyranny may always enter—there is no charm or bar against it." -- July 19, 1984, during the coal miners' strike.

"Economics are the method; the object is to change the heart and soul." Sunday Times, May 1, 1981.

"We can do business together." -- Dec. 17, 1984, speaking of Mikhail Gorbachev.

"No one would remember the good Samaritan if he'd only had good intentions. He had money as well." -- Jan. 6, 1986, television interview.

"There is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families." -- Oct. 31, 1987, magazine interview.

"We are a grandmother." -- March 3, 1989, announcing the birth of her first grandchild.

"If you just set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any time and you would achieve nothing." -- May 3, 1989, commenting on her 10th anniversary as prime minister.

"I cannot imagine how any diplomat, or any dramatist, could improve on (Ronald Reagan's) words to Mikhail Gorbachev at the Geneva summit: 'Let me tell you why it is we distrust you.' Those words are candid and tough and they cannot have been easy to hear. But they are also a clear invitation to a new beginning and a new relationship that would be rooted in trust." -- Eulogy at the funeral of former President Ronald Reagan, June 11, 2004.

This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. Distribution and use of this material are governed by our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact Dow Jones Reprints at 1-800-843-0008 or visit www.djreprints.com.